


Strange Bedfellows

by foolishgames



Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-18
Updated: 2015-09-23
Packaged: 2018-04-21 08:28:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4822187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolishgames/pseuds/foolishgames
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Imperator Furiosa takes a mute feral as her personal slave. It's her right. She must be obeyed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“That one,” says the voice, and it takes Max a moment to figure out why that voice stands out, which is long enough for his ghostly captors to take the bottom out of his cage and hammer him with shock-sticks until he drops, dangling, upside-down. Every time. It’s the only little rebellion he’s got.

The owner of the voice is behind him now. “Psychotic?” she says. Something cool and sharp touches his back, and Max doesn’t flinch.

“Bites like a motherfucker,” says the rough man the others all defer to. “Strong, but he’s feral.”

Max is swung around, abruptly, and finds himself nose-to-nose with a severe-looking woman with a sheared head. She steps back a notch, and hooks something wickedly sharp through the tines of his muzzle - a glove? - forcing him to tilt his head so she can meet his eyes. Her gaze is careful, level, and she peers shrewdly at him. “He’ll do,” she says, still holding him still. “Cut him down and take him to my quarters.”

“He’s a fucking wild animal,” protests the man. “He’ll tear you to shreds!”

“He’d tear _you_ to shreds, Organic,” returns the woman calmly, and shoves her bare fingers through the muzzle, pressing against Max’s mouth. He is, for a baffled moment, too shocked to bite. “He just needs handling.” She pats Max vaguely on the side of the head and releases him to swing.

“You can’t take him, I need him here, for the boys,” says Organic, but the pale boys are already winching Max down and adjusting his bindings so he can hobble to wherever he’s being taken. “He’s a universal donor!” says Organic desperately. “Look, take that one, he’s B-neg, I don’t need him.”

“Do you know what Imperator means, Organic?” the woman says as the boys march Max away. “Do you know what I am?”

He doesn’t hear Organic’s reply, swallowed up in the rock walls.

He gets turned around trying to remember the way the boys take him, though he thinks overall they’re going down - down from the dizzying heights he’d nearly fallen from, which is fine. Down means closer to freedom; with only one admittedly terrifying woman between him and escape. He doesn’t struggle. He likes this development.

He likes it less when they get where they’re going and the boys, laughing, strip him naked before chaining him to the wall of the small room. There’s a hook sunk into the rock they use, and not even an arm-length of chain between it and back of the muzzle - not even enough to sit down, let alone get to the door, and his arms are still bound behind him in any case. The boys snigger to each other before they leave, and Max is alone.

The room isn’t large or luxurious at all: a narrow, windowless cell with a narrow cot along one wall, a rickety table scattered with tools, and a door that bolts from the inside. He can’t reach the table with its tools, nor the door and its promise of freedom, nor even the blankets piled on the cot. He can’t do a damn thing but wait.

So wait he does.

His vision swims as his body settles back into being upright. He shifts his weight from foot to foot and grumbles at the pain in his bad knee; realises suddenly that there’s enough slack in the chain that he could kneel, just not enough to sit. Stays stubbornly upright anyway. Won’t be kneeling in front of the Imperator when she comes. He can’t fight like this, naked and hobbled, and what he might have to do to earn being unchained brings bile to his throat, but he won’t be kneeling when she comes.


	2. Chapter 2

Furiosa doesn’t return to her quarters immediately. She stops by the garage to check on the repairs to the rig’s undercarriage after the scuffle with the Bone Boys, gets a status update from Ace, draws a canister of aqua-cola at the pumps to share with some of the more breathless-looking Pups. When enough time has passed that she won’t appear over-eager to partake in the spoils of the raid she’d led last week, she makes her way to the small room she’d picked for herself.

The other Imperators mostly have larger rooms - some of them are even over in the green tower. They’re closer to the pumps, closer to Joe, closer to the green: the air there is cleaner and the water fresher and they can curry Joe’s favour and stroke his ego. Furiosa satisfies herself with being extremely good at her job instead of at kissing ass, and has a much smaller room with a steel door five inches thick that bolts from the inside. She’d sleep in a cupboard if she could lock it.

The sound of the door opening seems to startle the bloodbag - the man. The prisoner. He lurches up from his slump against the wall like he’s going to attack, only to be brought up short by the paltry length of his bindings. He doesn’t quite lose his footing, but she can see it’s a near thing, and his eyes, behind the threatening uppermost spikes of the muzzle, are as feral as Organic had warned her.

She’s pleased to see that the War Boys have correctly interpreted her hints as to what old Bag-o-Nails would want with a pretty meat-puppet; that’ll be a useful rumour to encourage, but right now getting the feral’s trust is a priority, and that means pants.

“What’s your name?” she says, letting the door fall shut behind her. He only eyes her warily. She bends at the waist and grabs up the heap of clothing the Boys left, approaches him cautiously, prosthetic held out to the side so he can see it clearly. “What do I call you?”

No answer. Fair enough.

“You want outta that?” she asks. He twitches, eyes sliding away. “Lemme get to your hands.”

She thinks he’s going to resist, but he stares at her like he can burn her flesh away with his eyes, and then turns to offer his hands. The short chain means his face is almost jammed into the rock, and his whole body is trembling with tension.

Getting his wrists free drags out of him the first noise he’s made: a low, grateful groan. His fingers flex, hands rotate at the wrists, and he draws them to his belly and turns to put his back to the wall. Furiosa steps back warily out of grabbing range as the bloodbag’s eyes dart around, frantic and assessing, over and over. She holds out his clothes. “You thirsty?”

He makes another noise, this one a high whine, and snatches the bundle from her. She takes that as a yes. Turning her back on him is calculated; something that might be privacy, might be trust. There’s water still in the big canister, but it’ll be tough with the muzzle on, and she doesn’t trust him that much yet. There’s a canteen in her desk with a long neck which should serve, and she takes her time filling it, careful not to spill. When she turns back around he’s got his pants on, at least, and though he’s still wildly, visibly high-strung, he takes the water from her hand with care.

“If I unhitch you, will I regret it?” she says. He flinches. “I saw your ride, you know, before the chop-shop got it. Smooth piece of work.” She has to step right into his space to get to where the chain attaches to the wall. He huddles away from her, but keeps the neck of the bottle jammed between his face and the muzzle, dribbling water into his mouth. “Organic thinks you’re feral, but I say a feral couldn’t have survived like you did. Couldn’t have kept a sweet ride like that running. You’re not feral, you’re just fucking desperate to get out of here, right? And you’re smart enough to almost make it, earlier.”

The padlock is one of the simple ones the workshop churns out, easy when you know the trick. It clicks open, and she unhooks the chain easily, winds a couple of links around her steel fingers. He’s listening. She can see it in his eyes. She takes a deep breath, because if she’s wrong about this one Joe will have her skin sandblasted from her body over as many days as he can manage.

“How bad do you wanna get out of here, huh?” she says, low and careful. She looks him right in the eyes, and he’s so close now, and unchained, and god she hopes she isn’t wrong. “Bad enough to chew off your arm? I know what that’s like.” His eyes flick down, clock her prosthetic, and his brow furrows.

“I’m getting out of here,” she says, barely a breath. “Soon. Free and clear.” He stares. “Could use a partner.”

His eyes narrow, and he steps away from her, one two three, limping as he goes. The chain slides from her unresisting hand. She doesn’t stop watching him. He tilts his head, frowns, makes a soft questioning noise.

“‘Cause you’re smart,” she says. “I saw you drive, I saw your gear. You survived this long alone means you’re useful to me.”

He backs a little further away: moving deeper into the room, not toward the door, so she lets him. Touches the muzzle.

“Only if you promise not to bite me.”

One shoulder twitches. He looks wildly around the room, hunches over. Fingers flex again. “Must be obeyed,” he croaks, a voice that sounds like a sandstorm.

“Huh?”

“Imperator,” he says, points two fingers at her. “Means ‘must be obeyed’.”

Relief is like a blow to the belly. “I don’t want to be obeyed,” she confides. “I want to go home.”


	3. Chapter 3

The fierce-eyed Imperator leaves him alone in her room, appallingly trusting or viciously manipulative, Max doesn’t know which. The door is barred from the outside, so she doesn’t trust him that much, but he’s unchained and fully-clothed and there are at least four guns and a small but bright-edged knife in the room, so if it’s a trick, it’s a poor one.

He drinks some more water and goes through her things.

The table is scattered with tools and parts - bits of a pump of some sort, engine parts, a chunky old-fashioned battery pack, and a range of delicate jointed pieces that look like they might become part of a metal hand for her. He sifts through them carefully, not wanting to disturb anything too much - the pump might be useful as a club, in a pinch, but otherwise they’re not much use to him right now. The cot has a thin mattress with a groove in the shape of a sleeping person - the Imperator prefers to sleep on her left side, he notes from the dent, with her good arm free and her back to the wall. From a supine position she could reach - he checks - two guns, as well as a length of steel rebar tucked between the wall and the cot. The blankets are threadbare.

There’s a chest at the end of the bed, battered metal. Max fiddles with the lock - he could get it open, probably, but not without breaking it too badly to fix. He leaves it for now.

It’s a thin, shabby life the Imperator leads, spartan and heavily-armed. Despite the slavish obedience of the pale boys, the deference of the snorting medic, her quarters are small and bare of comfort. She’s cautious and guarded.

She’s running away soon.

He has to break that idea down into pieces to fit into his cracked-open brain. _These people_ have captured him and are holding him and he must get away from _these people_ , and the Imperator is one of _these people_.

The Imperator gave him water and took his chains off. The Imperator wants to get out of here, bad enough to chew off her arm. She could use a partner.

He takes another slug of water and thinks about that for a while.

The Imperator has the obedience and devotion of the white boys. She wants Max as a partner.

The Imperator has a room that locks and a bed and as much food and water as she likes. She wants to leave.

Max thinks and thinks until he can connect all of those things in his mind. The Imperator is powerful but she is not safe. The Imperator must-be-obeyed but she doesn’t trust those who obey.

There is someone else the pale boys spoke of in adoring, near-worshipful tones: sometimes _Joe_ , often _Immortan_ , occasionally (horribly) _Daddy_. Max thinks that if the Imperator is powerful, it is because of Joe, and if the Imperator is set on running away, it is because of Joe, and that if the Imperator cannot trust the pale boys or the Organic or any of the beggars at the base of the rocks, it is because of Joe.

Thinking is very tiring. Max isn’t used to thinking about other people. His stomach feels heavy and bruised with the water he’s putting in it, so he sets the canteen aside, close to hand, and takes one of the Imperator’s guns, and sits with his back to the wall so he can watch the door, and dozes.

He starts awake when the door opens, hours later: it’s the Imperator, looking weary, and it’s dark out. She doesn’t even flinch at the gun he points at her.

“Am gonna have to have the boys take you away for the night?” she asks bluntly. He makes some kind of noise. “If you kill me, you’ll never get out of here,” she promises, crossing to the desk and starting to unbuckle the straps which hold her metal arm on. “They’ll snag you before you make it anywhere near the ground, and they’ll cut out your tongue and hamstring you. Bloodbags don’t need to talk or walk.”

The whole arm comes off: it’s more complex than he suspected, braced and jointed at the shoulder and waist as well as the elbow and wrist. It’s heavy, too, more obviously so when she’s holding it instead of wearing it. The Imperator lays it on the table and examines it carefully, darts a look at Max from the corner of her eye.

She asked him a question, right.

“‘m not gonna,” he manages, which seems to satisfy her, and she returns to checking the limb for wear.

“You can stay in here if you want tomorrow,” she tells him. “Or you can come with me. Imperators are allowed to take their slaves. But they’ll expect, hmm. A certain attitude.”

His glare would be more effective if she was looking at him. She pulls a key from somewhere and unlocks the trunk at the end of the bed.

“Said you had a plan,” he says.

“I do.” She passes him a plasticky sack which turns out to contain a small soft apple and some dried meat. “It isn’t time yet.”

“When.”

She gives him a cool look. “Not yet.”

He grits his teeth and deliberately relaxes his hold on the pistol. “Tell me.”

She shuts the lid of the trunk with a snap. “You know what they’d do me to if they found out? It’s called shredding.” Her voice is bland and level. “They tie you down and scrape your skin off with sand made of crushed glass. And if you’re still alive they pin your eyes open and stake you out in the waste so you can watch the crows coming for you.”

“Just for leaving?”

Her face does something he can’t interpret. Faces are hard. “For traitoring him? Maybe.” She ducks her head and there’s a mean curl to her mouth. “But it’s what I’m taking with me that’ll make him really mad.”

That’s something to chew on, alright. Max subsides and shuffles himself into a corner, sticking a piece of meat in his mouth to soften up. “Gonna tell me,” he mutters, not sure if it’s a question or a demand.

“Eventually,” she says. She tosses a blanket at him, hits the lightswitch with the heel of her hand and lies down on her cot, as if she’s untroubled by his presence, unthreatened, but he can see her hand tucked under the pillow, holding onto the gun.

He tucks the rest of the food into his shirt to keep it safe, pulls the blanket around his shoulders, and settles.

He doesn’t sleep. Every time he shifts his weight on the hard floor, he can see the gleam of her eyes in the darkness, so he’s pretty sure she doesn’t either.


	4. Chapter 4

The bloodbag elects to come with her the following day.

She puts the shackles back on, which makes him growl unhappily, but they’re in front of him this time, and there’s enough chain he’s got some movement. She doesn’t bother with the muzzle.

“Don’t talk to anyone,” she says. “Stay behind me.” She waits for his reluctant nod. “Don’t make trouble. I need them to trust me.”

She can feel the tension in him as he trails her through the tunnels. He’s frightened of the War Boys and alarmed by the other slaves and baffled by the Citadel. In the garages he spots the sliver of light from the outside world past the lifts and she sees his whole body seize up with the desire to bolt. “Don’t be a fool,” she says under her breath, and he sags as his eyes dart over the War Boys and tread slaves and massed waiting vehicles. He shudders, but keeps to her shadow obediently.

Her crew are openly curious about their Boss’s new acquisition. “I thought he’d be shinier,” she hears Rack say to Lommy. “Like, real special shiny. But he’s just some drifter.”

“She’s only had him a day,” Lommy scolds. “She en’t had time to fix him up yet, get him tuned and polished.”

They both turn to squint assessingly at the bloodbag, who glowers mutinously while Furiosa pretends to ignore him. “He en’t even tall,” says Rack.

“Not like he needs to be tall, to do stud. S’long as he can, y’know,” says Lommy, and the pair of them dissolve into teenage-boy giggles until Ace appears behind them to twist their ears.

“He coming on the shakedown run, Boss?” says Ace. Ace always looks dubious, thanks to his unfortunate scarring and the droop from when his facial tumours were removed, but he looks more dubious than usual today.

“We’ll see,” says Furiosa. She doubts the bloodbag would be able to resist making trouble with only a dozen War Boys between him and freedom; she wants to save that urge for the actual escape. “Fool, come.”

The bloodbag pulls a face, but falls in behind her as she circles the War Rig, checking on the crews swarming it. “Water,” she tells him, pointing. “Milk, other storage. Normally produce. For trade.”

He thinks about that, taking in the size of the rig. “Valuable.” Thinks some more. “Risky. Lot of guards.” He squints at her. “You drive it.”

“Next run’s in four days,” she says. “Doing some drills tomorrow. Not you.” A Warboy brushes past them, coughing dryly.

He nods. His gaze is attentive, alert, and his shoulders are squared. She can practically see his brain ticking along. “Them?”

“Full complement’s fifteen. The War’s Rig’s a prime posting, only the most loyal and able ride along.” One of the younger crew boys gives a happy cheer at that label.

He grunts. “Loyal to -” He jerks a thumb upwards.

“The Immortan Joe.”

A nod. He frowns into the middle distance, fingers twitching, and then he says, “Prestigious,” like he’s just dug the word out of the sand of his memory.

“You’re moving up in the world, Fool,” she tells him. Somebody snickers. “So long as you’re of use to me.”

His gaze settles on her briefly, before flicking away. “I can be of use,” he mutters.

She takes that for as much of a guarantee you can expect in the wasteland, and leaves him standing there while she clambers into the cab of the rig to run checks.

The Rig on its own would be prize enough worth killing for: armed, armoured and nigh-unstoppable. Loaded with supplies, its worth was incalculable. Let the bloodbag believe it was the goal for now.

She flicks the lights, checks the mirrors, runs through the killswitches. Through the window she sees one of the bolder boys approach the bloodbag, curiously reaching for the shackles. He bares his teeth in a snarl, and when the War Boy doesn’t back off, snaps at him in a genuine-looking bite.

Furiosa hammers her metal hand against the door of the rig. “You touching what’s mine?” she demands of the boy, who makes a high-pitched noise and skitters nervously away. She points at the shackled man. “Don’t you bite my crew,” she says. “They’re worth more to the Citadel than you are, Fool.”

He glares at her, hunches his shoulders, nods his understanding.

The War Boys avoid him for the rest of the morning.

“Slaves aren’t worth much,” she tells him in a low voice as he tails her back to her quarters. “Blood, meat, breeding. Don’t give ‘em a reason. I can’t protect you if you’re stupid.”

He grunts, doesn’t answer, and then Rictus Erectus steps into their path.

“I hear you got yourself a wife, Nails” he booms. “Not very pretty.”

“Does the job,” says Furiosa, and moves to step around him.

Rictus’ size is deceptive. He lashes out, quick as a striking snake, and has the Fool by the side of the head before the shackled slave can so much as cry out.

“You shouldn’t touch things that aren’t yours, Rictus,” Furiosa tells him blandly. The Fool is gritting his teeth, trying not to struggle, clutching his hands in the chain connecting his wrists instead of grabbing Rictus. Smart.

“I could have a wife,” says Rictus sullenly. “I catch wives sometimes.”

“This one won’t give you babies.”

Rictus peers at the Fool, gives him a little shake. “And not pretty. What’s he for, then?”

“Me,” says Furiosa. “Come on, Fool.” She snaps her fingers, turns her back, and after a moment, hears the chains clinking, the Fool limping after her.

“Have you seen Cheedo?” Rictus says, fast and urgent.

Furiosa grits her teeth, turns to look over her shoulder at the child-giant. “You should listen to your father about that girl, Rictus,” she tells him.

“Dad said I can have a wife one day. Maybe I’ll have Cheedo.”

Furiosa takes a moment to imagine the consequences if Rictus got a child on a woman where Joe had failed. It’s not a pretty picture. “Maybe.” Rictus has been obsessed with his father’s newest wife since she arrived; he’d been on the raid that took her, and had held her in his lap on the drive back to the Citadel, stroking her hair and telling her how pretty she was. He’d sulked for days after Joe put her in the vault.

She puts a proprietary hand on the Fool’s neck and guides him away. He’s trembling under her hand, breathing hard through his nose and hanging white-knuckled onto the chain connecting his wrists, and when the door to her quarters shuts behind them, he lurches away from her to get his back to the wall.

She gives him her disinterest, facing away and rolling her aching shoulders.

“ _Wife_ ,” he wheezes, eventually.

“No,” she says. “Imperators don’t have wives. Only the Immortan.”

“Stud?” He spits the word the War Boys had used earlier.

She shrugs. “Imperators are allowed personal slaves. I haven’t, but some of the others have breeders.”

He looks revolted. She remembers her own churning horror matching his, but the years of keeping a neutral expression have blunted it. It almost comforts her to see: a man stricken with disgust at the thought of taking an unwilling woman. Perhaps she’s made the right choice.

“You’ll need to stay here,” she tells him. “I have other work to do, where I can’t bring you.” The key to the shackles goes on the table. He won’t meet her eyes. “I’ll bring you more food later.”

“This fucking place,” she hears him mumble. “This place.” She locks the door behind her.


End file.
